LUSH Emotional Brilliance - Power Swatches & Review

29 January 2016

Provided for review

LUSH Emotional Brilliance is a product that's always caught my eye in store but remained undabbled with until a short time ago, when I attended a LUSH event and was allowed to pick an item of my choosing. At the event we played with the LUSH colour wheel, which involves spinning the wheel and then picking out three colours that stand out to you as soon as the wheel stops spinning, without consciously thinking about your choices. Those three colour picks are supposed to represent three aspects: your strength or weakness, your subconscious and your ambition. I got Fantasy, Power and Ambition, which led me to conclude that I am secretly an evil queen.

If you haven't heard of the Emotional Brilliance range, they're a collection of eyeshadows, eyeliners and multi-tasking lip and cheek products, each named for a particular emotion or trait. They're sold in identical 5ml vials, with the eyeshadows and lip/cheek products including a doefoot applicator and the eyeliners having a skinny brush tip. They're all laid out by colour in the store and alphabetically on the NZ website, so there isn't really an easy way to identify which colour might be for this or that function, short of opening each vial or clicking into each product listing on the site. To save you a bit of time, I've collated their uses below:

When it came to choosing one to bring home with me, I decided to opt for Power, a warm gold-shimmered red because I love a multi tasker and let's face it, when red is on the table, I'll always go for it. Because red lipstick is life.

Swatched on bare skin under daylight bulbs

Poweris a rich, warm red with intense golden shimmer and great colour pay off. It's a very emollient formula, which makes it ideal for blending out seamlessly on cheeks, but lets it down when applied to lips, where it slips around and is difficult to even out completely. It's a shame, because the golden glow is absolutely STUNNING! I'll layer this over a lipliner or a similar lipstick next time I wear it because I love the final effect too much to let it go, but I think LUSH need to tweak their formula a little more to find that perfect half way point.

Points for general ease of application though - the doe foot applicator was easy to control for a defined lip shape and can be used to dab the products on cheeks, too. I found a little went a very long way as a blush and that I could blend it out with my fingers without displacing the foundation beneath. A stippling brush works great too.

When I tested Power for wear, it lasted for just under eleven hours on my cheeks and four and a half hours on lips. It was drying towards the end of wear when used as a lipstick, but I didn't experience any issues with feathering - surprising, given the emollience! This has a very faint scent of roses, though a touch greener.

What I liked:

Excellent colour pay off

Blends out beautifully on cheeks

Wears for just under eleven hours on cheeks, four and a half hours on lips

Doesn't feather or migrate on lips

What I didn't like:

Super emollient formula makes it difficult to even out the colour completely on lips

Drying towards the end of wear on lips

Where to buy:

LUSH products can be purchased at LUSH Online (NZ) or you can find your nearest LUSH store using the store locator. International readers can find their local LUSH site here!

Have you tried any of the LUSH Emotional Brilliance products? I'd love to hear your thoughts on them.